47 Hignpoint, North Hill, Highgate, LONDON, N6. before 23 May 1948 Dear Miss Kober, Thank you very much for your very helpful letter. I'm glad you approve, in general, of the form of transcription. Perhaps it might be better to number the doubtful signs alpha- betically - it would avoid the extra width of double figures (provided there aren't more than 26 in one inscr) and might save confusion with the line-numbering in the appendix. Possibly they might even be drawn as a heavy letter without the square: it might make a more attractive page, provided it was done with a careful distinction in weight. There are probably other improve- ment that'll suggest themselves. _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_ _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_ _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_ I haven't heard from Sir John lately, and I gathered from his last letter that he hadn't quite decided yet which, if not both, methods of publication he was proposing, the printed or the repro- duced. You probably know much better than I do what the intended form of Scripta Minoa 2 is, and whether it is going to answer the purposes of specialized study. At any rate I'll take on anything that's badly needed. At the moment I'm engaged in rather a tricky architectural competition, but after that I think I shall have to devote the rest of the year whole time to Minoan, because it isn't really worth doing it in fits and starts. I'm still toying with the idea of an alphabetic code for my own purposes, because it's useful to be able to run off copies on the typewriter, and having a direct letter-order may help in statistical work. But admittedly it's one of those things that only work for the originator, and need quite a bit of learning for him! Briefly I'll take vowel+consonant syllables ( assuming the real phonetic values are, in contradiction, consonant+vowel) based on the 6 vowels A E I O U Y and the remaining 20 English letters, and give:- the A- E- I- series to Myres' AB series, with additions and cutting out non-phonetic signs, the 0- series to phonetic signs peculiar to B, and the U- and Y- series to ideographs. The Pylos tablet, as far as I can read it, would then run something like this: IMIPAG ' IHID-A-AC ' EDAGAL ' afac IJIHEK ' OKANAF ' ikojad 1 IJALEP akonop ' afac ' AKEJ omop 1 (or: AKEJOMOP ?) &c. It looks rather like Eskimo, I'm afraid. Thank you very much for the photo, which is clear except for one or two signs: I'd be very glad to have a transcription. I think it would be best if the Knossos copies went to Sir John for the present. I've been afraid for some time that Linear A and Linear B might turn out to be different languages, but if it retilly is so, then I suppose we shall have to face up to it. Personally, I don't feel I know enough about the material to venture an opinion. But can I guess the reasons for your own conclusion: - ?